Wages for tipped workers need to increase
Iam one of those clueless (and older) people who did not realize until your very thorough article (“Tipping culture changing since pandemic,” Dec. 23) how incredibly low the minimum wage for tipped wage-earners is.
This situation is ridiculous, completely illogical and, frankly, inhumane. If a “standard” tip is 20 percent, then it would be logical for the minimum wage of a tipped wage-earner to be 20 percent lower than the rate of the standard minimum wage. That would make the minimum wage for a tipped earner $9.20 per hour, increasing to $9.60 in January, almost triple what it is currently. That’s $2.80 per hour, increasing to $3.00 in January.
If this were the case, would that increase the cost for restaurant owners? Certainly, and dramatically so. However, it is a cost they should have been paying for many years. If this increased cost means that restaurants must further streamline their operations, that the prices of menu items increase so dramatically that people will not pay them, or that some restaurants go out of business, then that will have to happen — even though the same shortchanged workers will then lose their jobs.
Or not. In point of fact, 28 state in the United States have minimum wage rates for tipped workers that are within $3 per hour of standard minimum wages. Six states have rates that are equivalent for both tipped and nontipped workers. And you know what? They all have lots of restaurants. The discrepancy we have is not necessary in order to operate restaurants successfully — 28 states have proved that. Five of them are right around us geographically. Check the Economic Policy Institute (epi.org/ minimum-wage-tracker/epi.org).
The entire system needs to change. Keeping businesses open on the backs of tipped workers is nothing more than using slave labor. And that is not only immoral, it’s a stupid business model. However, clearly this won’t change until change is forced.
The city of Santa Fe should take this up and increase tipped minimum wages to a decent level. Leaders are not likely to do so because of the power of the restaurant lobby. But they really should. Perhaps someone should organize the workers? (I am not volunteering.)